A commenter on one of my sounds noted that a seemingly well-know artist used a sample I made and as far as I can tell the sample wasn't attributed per the CC license. The sample makes up a fairly major part of the song which is the only reason I'm even asking about this. What should I do now?

What a wonderful song you have made. It sound realy great! I like it that you used my sound for that you used my sound fFor that. What i was wondering is where i can find the credits for me and freesond

I had a friendly response from the management who will confirm with the artist it is my sample and then add correct attribution (currently it is a free online release).As an aside he noted that he "was under the incorrect impression that freesound provided samples free of all copyrights". I suspect that is a common mis-conception and perhaps in future designs the license can be more clear somehow.In any case, here is the sample:http://www.freesound.org/people/Corsica_S/sounds/51425/Here is the song:http://picturesmusic.bandcamp.com/track/shimmerWhat do you think?Thanks for the help.

Maybe a little reminder text could be placed under the download button on samples and packs.Something along the lines of: "This sample may not be copyright freee. Please make sure you understand your copyright obligations before downloading."

We need to make sure it is not too off-putting.I will email Bram.

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Actually it is already there for samples:Just under the download button there is the text "This work is licensed under the Attribution License." which is actually a link...

So people do need to read and understand what is there... I don't think it can be made any more obvious or clearer...

I will ask Bram if it can be added next to the download button for packs.

Yes, the license is certainly there for people paying attention. But it is not directly "connected" to downloading. My thought was something like the download button could say "download and license" or something and when pressed a dialog would appear saying something like "this sample is licensed with CC attribution if you need a difference license please contact the uploader." But thinking about it now I'd rather have Freesound be less annoying than that.In any case I'm not sure how big of a deal it is, I know plenty of people do respect the licenses. Those that don't want to won't not matter what and it seems wrong to make everyone else suffer.

The laws (and the application) of copyright can be a funny thing.Most of the time, something can be done about it if there is money to be made. If someone releases a commercial track and is selling records and did not give attribution, basically they owe you money.If it is a free release, a free youtube video or a free game... You can winge, but if they made no money out of it themselves ...

Although there is an element of ethics, correctness and respect to it, ultimately the people who are involved with and contribute to freesound so it for the benefit of the users that respect the spirit and the rules of the Creative Commons, despite the fact that some users don't.We believe the world is a better place if people are allowed the artistic freedom to work with the sounds we upload - even if some people abuse that freedom.

Quote AlienXXX The laws (and the application) of copyright can be a funny thing.Most of the time, something can be done about it if there is money to be made. If someone releases a commercial track and is selling records and did not give attribution, BASICALLY THEY OWE YOU MONEY....end Quote.

You may be right but i hope you are wrong because the whole point of my choosing an attribution license for my sounds is to assure users that they can make money with them without having to pay me anything.If users neglect to attribute as this license requires then i assume there exists a legal course to force them to do so.However i would not expect to make financial gain out of any such action,to do so would feel like a step back into the verysame copyright morass that i'm trying to avoid.

I was somewhat draconian in my comments. And I appologise (I was in a bad mood).What I meant was that, should a friendly resolution of such a dispute fail, should one take it to the court, usually the resolution would imply some sort of financial compensation. - That is how the world works and no lawyer or court would spend time on it otherwise - That is what I meant on the first half of my post.

The ending remarks of my post are more in the spirit of Freesound(ers).Basically we put our sounds "out there", realistically we have no control over what happens other than to ask the users to follow the Creative Commons license we apply to our material.I guess the only time a Freesounder will think "I better do something about this copyright infringement" is if a major movie or a top musical hit is using one of his sounds.Yes, there will be people who will abuse it (and it is easy to abuse).The point of it is that all the people who can't pay for sounds - the youtube movie makers, the amateur theater groups, the bedroom musicians and the kids with school projects - have a free resource which they can use to realize their creativity.That is the whole point. Everything else is just ... erm... noise (pardon the pun)

Just contact the management, the artist and if you can get the email address the legal department of the record label.

"Hi, superb song, I love that you used my sample, however legally you're required to attribute me (as per [insert link to CC-license human readable text and full legal text]. It would be great if you guys could fix this ASAP."

99% of the time they'll fix the problem, especially if you just tell them that you're cool with them using your sample.

If not, we can make some noise about it.

- bram

Warning: if you break the rules, see my avatar.
Freesound Admin, Moderator, Ex-Freesound-Coder & Benevolent Dictator For Life.

AlienXXX wrote:What I meant was that, should a friendly resolution of such a dispute fail, should one take it to the court, usually the resolution would imply some sort of financial compensation. - That is how the world works and no lawyer or court would spend time on it otherwise - That is what I meant on the first half of my post.

Which is why -when you contact the legal department of record labels- they will bend over backwards to make sure that everything is fine. Especially once you tell them that you're a friendly guy/gall who just wants a mention of his/her name.

You can go a bit further and get a nice copy of the disk and some concert tickets

If you really want to make it a full-out battle, better get the EFF & CC involved

( https://www.eff.org/ )

- bram

Warning: if you break the rules, see my avatar.
Freesound Admin, Moderator, Ex-Freesound-Coder & Benevolent Dictator For Life.